My wife had a room mate who is one of these LDS liberal and runs the Sunstone show. I am ashamed of her and her ilk:
"Unfortunately, some are among us who claim to be Church members but
are somewhat like the scoffers in Lehi’s vision—standing aloof and
seemingly inclined to hold in derision the faithful who choose to accept
Church authorities as God’s special witnesses of the gospel and his
agents in directing the affairs of the Church.
There are those in
the Church who speak of themselves as liberals who, as one of our former
presidents has said, “read by the lamp of their own conceit.” (Joseph
F. Smith, Gospel Doctrine [Deseret Book Co., 1939], p. 373.) One time I
asked one of our Church educational leaders how he would define a
liberal in the Church. He answered in one sentence: “A liberal in the
Church is merely one who does not have a testimony.”
Dr. John A.
Widtsoe, former member of the Quorum of the Twelve and an eminent
educator, made a statement relative to this word liberal as it applied
to those in the Church. This is what he said:
“The self-called
liberal [in the Church] is usually one who has broken with the
fundamental principles or guiding philosophy of the group to which he
belongs. … He claims membership in an organization but does not believe
in its basic concepts; and sets out to reform it by changing its
foundations. …
“It is folly to speak of a liberal religion, if that religion claims that it rests upon unchanging truth.”
And then Dr. Widtsoe concludes his statement with this: “It is well to
beware of people who go about proclaiming that they are or their
churches are liberal. The probabilities are that the structure of their
faith is built on sand and will not withstand the storms of truth.”
(“Evidences and Reconciliations,” Improvement Era, vol. 44 [1941], p.
609.) (1971 April General Conference, The Iron Rod, Sun. Afternoon
Session - Harold B. Lee)
The quote he references too is just as golden.
"Some men there will be who would limit the power of God to the power
of men, and we have some of these among us and they have been among our
school teachers. They would have you disbelieve the inspired accounts of
the Scriptures, that the winds and the waves are subject to the power
of God; and believe the claim of the Savior to cast out devils, raise
the dead, or perform miraculous things, such as cleansing the leper, is
only a myth. They would make you believe that God and his Son Jesus
Christ did not appear in person to Joseph Smith, that this was simply a
myth, but we know better; the testimony of the Spirit has testified that
this is the truth. And I say, beware of men who come to you with
heresies that things come by laws of nature of themselves, and that God
is without power.
Among the Latter-day Saints, the preaching of
false doctrines disguised as truths of the gospel, may be expected from
people of two classes, and practically from these only; they are:
First—The hopelessly ignorant, whose lack of intelligence is due to
their indolence and sloth, who make but feeble effort, if indeed any at
all, to better themselves by reading and study; those who are afflicted
with a dread disease that may develop into an incurable malady—laziness.
Second—The proud and self-vaunting ones, who read by the lamp
of their own conceit; who interpret by rules of their own contriving;
who have become a law unto themselves, and so pose as the sole judges of
their own doings. More dangerously ignorant than the first.
Beware of the lazy and the proud."
(Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph F. Smith, Chapter 13: Stand by the Truth Lest You Be Deceived)
